House of Commons Hansard Debates for 21 Feb 1991

Mr. Deputy Speaker : Order. The hon. Member is now anticipating amendments standing in his name that have been selected for debate.

Mr. Davis : I appreciate your point, Mr. Deputy Speaker, and I shall discard that part of my speech.

My constituents say, "We accept not only the concept but the thinking behind it." My constituents are more impressed by the arguments that have been advanced by my hon. Friends than by those of the hon. Member for Yardley. After all, in the debates on the Bill the hon. Member for Yardley talked about the scheme being modern, up to date and necessary to raise the image of the passenger transport area. My constituents are more impressed by the arguments of my hon. Friends about the Metro regenerating derelict industrial areas and providing jobs. None of us wants to stand in the way of that. When the hon. Member for Yardley concedes that it would make a major contribution to regenerating derelict and economically depressed areas, my constituents say that that is fine, and indeed that sentiment is expressed in the statement that hon. Members have received urging them to consider the Bill. I will not read the whole of that statement, issued on behalf of the promoter, in support of consideration of the Bill as amended in Committee, but it says in paragraph 6 :

"It is also expected that the development of the metro network will make a major contribution to the regeneration of derelict or economically depressed areas and bring major benefits in the improvement of the environment."

The first part of that sentence is welcome and endorsed by my constituents. But the estate that I have been describing is not a derelict or economically depressed area--certainly not in that sense, although many people there are unemployed--and it is not a derelict or industrial wasteland.

My constituents agree that the Metro should run through the Heartlands area, as it is called, in the city of Birmingham, as that is an old industrial area. I am sure that were I to ask all the councillors in my constituency about that, they would agree with the desirable aim of regenerating derelict and economically depressed areas.

But that is not what we are discussing. The section of the route with which I am concerned does not come into that category. After the city centre bit of the route, it goes through a derelict industrial area--the scheme is definitely to be welcomed there--but it then proceeds through an ordinary residential area, where it is not to be welcomed.

The promoter's statement says that the system will bring major benefits through the improvement of the environment. My constituents do not accept that and say

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that it will bring a major--or at least a minor--deterioration in the environment. The statement says that the use of electric power should assist in the reduction of local pollution from exhaust fumes. That is not true because the system will not replace any traffic running through the estate. Part of the statement harks back to another point that I made--that the vehicles intended for the Metro will result in lower noise levels than those experienced from buses and trains. But it will not replace buses and trains on that section of the route. It may replace some buses and trains, but I am not sure that my hon. Friends would want that because that would simply be to substitute one form of public transport for another. I shall return to that. One has to make a value judgment about which form of public transport is best, and I am not convinced that the Metro is superior to buses. I emphasise again that I see advantages in light rail rapid transit systems for getting people quickly to and from the national exhibition centre, but that does not have to be done by imposing extra noise on people who live in the estate that I have described. For all those reasons, my constituents were unhappy and wanted an alternative route. I shall not describe that in detail now because we may come to it later, although that may be difficult for technical reasons that I shall explain. My constituents submitted an alternative which met the objectives in the promoter's statement and would have benefited and helped to regenerate a derelict industrial area. That derelict area has just been added to the Heartlands. Therefore, all the arguments that apply to the Heartlands apply to the area which my constituents suggest could benefit from this modern system of transport.

Mr. Deputy Speaker : Order. I am sorry to interrupt the hon. Gentleman again. I know that he is speaking strongly on behalf of his constituents, but his arguments about different routes and the like would be much more relevant to the amendments that have been selected for debate later.

Mr. Davis : The trouble is that my amendment has not been selected for debate. I quite understand that and I would not challenge Mr. Speaker's selection. The Clerk has explained why the amendment, which is in line with what my constituents have asked for, cannot be debated. I shall not go into the merits of my amendments, which are different from what my constituents suggest. There is no identity between my amendments and the argument that I am advancing. My amendments recognise that what my constituents suggest cannot be accepted by the House at this late stage.

Mr. Deputy Speaker : Order. We are considering a technical motion on whether the Bill should be considered. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman realises that in developing his arguments at length, as he is perfectly entitled to do, he must address himself to the fairly technical proceedings in which we are engaged.

Mr. Davis : My argument is that we should not consider this Bill because the alternative was rejected by the passenger transport authority. I am not allowed to promote that route in the House. The passenger transport authority did not properly and fairly consider the alternative. If it had, I would not oppose the Bill. The passenger transport authority did not reject the proposal

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out of hand. It gave three reasons why my constituents' suggestion could not be put into effect. I will not describe those in detail because I do not want to trespass on your kindness and generosity, Mr. Deputy Speaker. The three reasons were briefly that, first, the Centro officers who were mentioned--described as heads by the hon. Member for Yardley, but who I consider to be junior, little heads--said it was not physically possible. That was disproved. They have had to drop that because when I asked the city engineer if it was physically possible he said that it was, so that argument cannot be advanced, and is knocked on the head.

The second argument which has been made

Mr. Bevan rose--

Mr. Davis : I shall give way later. The hon. Gentleman has interrupted quite often and it was he who complained about the length of my speech. If this goes on I shall not have time to finish it-- [Interruption.] Does the hon. Member for Sheffield, Hallam (Mr. Patnick) wish to intervene, because I would always give way to him? No, he does not.

The second reason given for rejecting my constituents' suggestion was that it was estimated to cost £16.5 million. That estimate was subsequently reduced by Centro to £12.5 million, but it then admitted under questioning that this section of the route in the Bill to which we are objecting would cost £2.7 million. If £2.7 million is deducted from £12.5 million, that, in round figures, is an extra £10 million which my constituents wanted to spend.

The hon. Member for Yardley told the House on 22 October in an intervention in my speech that I got it wrong. He said that the cost of the route, as put forward in the Bill, is £6 million. I am happy to be corrected. The Centro officers have told me that it costs £2.7 million, but the hon. Gentleman, to whom I must defer because he introduced the Bill in the House, said that it would cost £6 million. We have been told that the cost of the alternative, which I shall not describe in detail, would be £12.5 million. But the hon. Member for Yardley says that this section in the Bill would cost £6 million. It follows, does it not, that the extra cost is £6.5 million? Will you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, make a special note of that because it is important that my constituents were asking for an amendment which would cost only £6.5 million. That compares with the total cost of £273 million. That is the hon. Member for Yardley's latest figure, as of October, for the cost of the whole route, not the whole network.

Mr. Bevan : I must correct the hon. Gentleman, who consistently seeks to belittle the status of the heads of Centro. He has tried to downgrade them to junior heads. He has tried to say that they are not correctly represented and he is as accurate on that as he is on many other matters. He is quite wrong. Ray Hughes is the head of Metro Development--I repeat that and I should like the hon. Gentleman to acknowledge it. John Fallon is the press and public relations manager--the head, not the junior head. Ray Dixon is the engineering design manager--the head--and Janet Kings is the principal planner. They are not junior heads. They are not also-rans. They are not middle executives. They are as described--the heads of the department.

Mr. Davis : I thought that the hon. Member for Yardley was going to help me with more figures and tell me that the

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cost of the alternative was even lower than we had been told before and that the cost of the Bill was higher than we had been told before. He has not denied the figures that I have given.

On the question of heads, if it will satisfy the hon. Gentleman and stop him interrupting me, I will concede that Centro is a many-headed body. It is a positive hydra. It has lots and lots of heads. They are all heads. They are all talking heads.

Unlike the hon. Gentleman, I have worked in really big organisations. I was called a manager for many years, but I never described myself as a head. The people working with me would have been amazed if I had thought that I was a head of the company. I was certainly a manager, with many of those titles, but I never presumed to call myself a head of the company. I would have accepted the description of executive. I was a company executive at one stage. That is how I described myself. Later I had "manager" after my name and described myself as a manager, a perfectly respectable title. There is nothing wrong with being a manager. I have been one. I am a member of the managers' trade union. But that does not make one a head of an organisation.

I do not know how many heads the Government have, but nobody would suggest that the very generous Minister for Public Transport is a head of the Government. I do not think that he would even describe himself as a head of the Department. Like me, he is a modest man. He is an important person, but he is not the head of the Department of Transport, any more than I was the head of any of the organisations for which I worked. At least, I do not think that I was. However, let us not pursue that diversion any further.

The hon. Member for Yardley is trying to divert us from the cost. That cannot be denied. I am quoting the figures that the hon. Gentleman gave the House. He told the House that the cost of what is popularly known as the southern route is £6 million, compared with the cost of what is known locally as the northern route of £12.5 million. I got that figure from one of the people whom the hon. Gentleman calls a head of the organisation, so it cannot be contradicted. I am happy to have that person called the head. The difference between £12.5 million and £6 million is £6.5 million, which is a very important figure for two reasons. It is £6.5 million compared with a total estimate for the route--not just the section in my constituency, but the route from Birmingham to Solihull-- of £273 million, so we are talking about a little over 2 per cent. of the total cost.

The third reason why Centro rejected the alternative, which we cannot discuss this evening but which is relevant, is that they said that there would be a lower ridership if the route suggested by my constituents were adopted. They said that fewer people would use Metro. We asked them for figures, and they said that fewer people would use it because fewer people lived near that route. That is certainly true. That is why my constituents suggested it.

Mr. Deputy Speaker : Order. The hon. Gentleman has just said that there is a certain matter which we cannot discuss this evening. He now appears to be proceeding to discuss it.

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Mr. Davis : It is important because of something that the hon. Member for Yardley said. I will ask you in a moment, Mr. Deputy Speaker, whether you agree.

Centro told us that between 1,900 and 2,200 people would use the route described in the Bill from Birmingham to Solihull every day. Let me explain immediately, Mr. Deputy Speaker, that I do not intend to go into detail about how I think some of my amendments would keep that ridership, because that would be wrong and would delay progress, and I do not want to do that. Centro said that the passenger total was an important figure. I ask you, Mr. Deputy Speaker, to remember that, because I shall come back to it when I move the first group of amendments.

The promoters said that if we did not choose their scheme, or something close to it, ridership would be reduced to between 500 and 800 per day. We asked the promoters how the figures were made up. My constituents were told --in my hearing--that the figure of between 1,900 and 2,200 passengers a day, on the route laid down by the Bill, was made up of 75 per cent. who would transfer to the Metro from buses, 15 per cent. being new passengers who would not travel between Birmingham and Solihull if it were not for the Metro, and 10 per cent. being people who previously travelled by car. Let us take special note of those figures, which have been cited several times. The hon. Member for Yardley said today that the route described in the Bill would take a considerable number of vehicles off the road. He nods his head, so he must agree with me. Does it not follow, therefore, that the vehicles which will be taken off the road if the Bill is enacted will be buses, because three-quarters of the people using the Metro will have transferred from buses? On previous occasions, however, the hon. Member for Yardley said that the Bill was intended to relieve traffic congestion, that it would ensure increased use of the public transport network and would bring about environmental improvements. I shall not discuss those improvements because I have already done so at length.

My hon. Friends and I want to provide better public transport. We want people to use the public transport network, and so do my constituents. They are adamant about it. There is considerable criticism in my constituency and in the west midlands about the present inadequate public transport service, so of course we are in favour of improvements to it. But that is not what the Bill is about, because 75 per cent. of the passengers will have transferred from the existing public transport network and not from cars.

Let us consider the promoter's statement in support of consideration of the Bill as amended in Committee. It says : "It is expected that the Metro network will play an important role in reversing the decline in the use of public transport. It will not of itself solve all traffic problems on roads but will assist to this end. It is also likely to defer for several years the need for some highway improvements or traffic control measures for the relief of congestion on roads."

The hon. Member for Yardley said something similar when he moved the motion for consideration of the Bill today, but I do not think that he is completely accurate. In my view, the promoter's statement is not correct. There are many reasons why we should have the Metro, and I shall give reasons why we are in favour of the project as a whole--I have already touched on some of them--but it is not true to say that it will reverse the decline in the use of public transport. The hon. Gentleman is right when he

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says that the Bill will not solve all the traffic problems--I suppose that that is a concession--and will not relieve congestion on the roads, because everyone knows that that is caused by motor cars and not by buses. If passengers transfer from buses instead of cars, the impact on congestion will be slight. The hon. Member for Yardley ought to concede that argument because it is the inevitable logic of the arithmetic supplied by the people whom he describes as the "heads" of Centro.

On an earlier occasion, the hon. Member for Yardley also said that car use has increased, and asked us to support the Bill because buses and cars would be provided with free car parks, enabling passengers to use trains following the Midland Metro Act 1989. I see no logic in that argument ; there is no connection between the 1989 Act and increased car use, although there is a connection between that Act and the Bill that we are discussing. The 1989 Act introduced the first of these routes, which I believe will run from Birmingham to Wolverhampton. I did not oppose it, although the hon. Member for Yardley keeps trying unfairly and inaccurately to suggest that I did. I simply cannot get it into the hon. Gentleman's head that I opposed neither the 1989 Act nor the concept that it embodied ; there was no reason for me to do so. None the less, he is wrong to suggest that the Act provided benefits that it did not provide--and, indeed, has been unable to provide, as the route has not been built, and whether it is ever built will depend on the Department of Transport. Even if it is built, the route will not help the buses. As it has not yet been built, it has provided no car parks, and there are no proposals for them in either the Act or this Bill. The hon. Gentleman has suggested that such a large network implies the existence of a free car park, but there is no such thing, as I know to my cost--or, rather, I do not, because I have been given a pass, but that is because I am a Member of Parliament. As far as I know, no one else is given free parking facilities, unless they are granted to employees of Birmingham station.

Mr. Bevan : I am trying to help the hon. Gentleman. I have taken advice on the matter, and I am told that the promoters of the Bill expect 10 per cent. of people to abandon their motor cars for the Metro. They expect perhaps 15 per cent. more traffic to be generated. I have also been told that between 20 per cent. and 40 per cent. eventually transfer from cars to the Metro in other parts of Europe where the system has been installed. The hon. Gentleman is making very heavy weather of all this. Fewer people will use cars, and the reduction in the number of car users will increase as time goes on.

Mr. Davis : What the hon. Gentleman has not told us is how long we must wait for that transfer. We have not been told before about an eventual transfer of between 20 per cent. and 40 per cent. My constituents have not heard anything about it when they have talked to the people described by the hon. Gentleman as heads of Centro. He has given us some fresh information today, but he has not told us whether the transfer will happen next year, next century, or later--and he does not look as though he intends to do so. I suspect that he will not do so because he does not know.

Mr. Bevan : I have made it clear that the system, once established, will prove attractive and popular enough to win over more car users than it will at the beginning. I expect the initial 10 per cent. figure to rise to the

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continental norm of between 20 per cent. and 40 per cent., which it may do at any point after the system has been installed and allowed to mature. I do not want to be a crystal ball gazer, but perhaps the hon. Gentleman does--I certaintly wish he would look at the crystal ball rather than at the mud.

Mr. Davis : The hon. Gentleman invites me to look into a crystal ball. I am not sure that my hon. Friends want me to engage in such speculation, nor do I think that it would be fair to the promoter. The point is that the hon. Gentleman has been unable to give us a date. He talks of what will happen when the system has "matured". That is typical of the predictions of Conservative Members--they are always telling us that things will get better, but they never say when. Unemployment, for instance, is always going to come down, but we never hear when it will do so, and, in our experience, it generally goes up.

Mr. Dennis Turner (Wolverhampton, South-East) : Will my hon. Friend give way?

Mr. Davis : If my hon. Friend will allow me to finish what I am saying, I will give way to him a little later. He has been very patient, and I much appreciate his courtesy.

The hon. Member for Yardley introduced the Bill with plenty of dash. Clearly he did not know the statistics that I read out, which is in itself instructive. After I had read them out, he simply repeated them as though he were giving the House new information. I told the House that the people whom the hon. Member calls the heads of Centro told my constituents that 75 per cent. of the passengers would be transferred from buses, 15 per cent. would be new traffic and 10 per cent. would be from cars. The hon. Gentleman then rushed from the Chamber, checked, came back and read out the same figures. So we have confirmed that. The only difference between us is that he says that the figure will eventually be 20 to 40 per cent. I do not know, and I am not looking into a crystal ball. Centro has said that it will be 75 per cent. from buses, 15 per cent. new traffic and 10 per cent. transferred from cars. That will happen immediately, which has not been denied, so we shall be able to monitor it. It is not a prediction for some unspecified time in the future when none of us--certainly not the hon. Member for Yardley--will be here anyway.

Mr. Turner : I am not anxious to intervene because I know that my hon. Friend the Member for Hodge Hill wants to make the case that he has been making, substantially on behalf of his constituents, but I wanted to ask him about the figures that we are discussing. Those of us who support the Metro firmly believe that it will make a real contribution to the relief of traffic congestion in the black country and the west midlands. My hon. Friend mentioned 10 per cent. I have just finished serving on the Committee on the Road Traffic Bill. The number of cars running across the roads of the west midlands and the black country grows year by year, causing major congestion. If we could move 10 per cent. of our car-owning population to the Metro, it would make a tremendous contribution. So even if it is no more that 10 per cent. of the hundreds of thousands of cars to begin with, it is right for us to believe that the number will grow as we get the route fully developed, and that will take even more cars off the road. If we can get 10 per cent. of car

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owners on to the Metro, it will make a majestic contribution to solving the road traffic problems of the west midlands.

Mr. Davis : There is no difference between my hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton, South-East and me, he will be delighted to learn. I agree completely with him. If we could get 10 per cent. on to the Metro it would make a majestic, to use his adjective, or perhaps one should say a major improvement in congestion, but I do not think that this Bill would do it. I understand my hon. Friend's enthusiasm and I share it, but I think that he has let himself be carried away slightly. I ask him to listen again to what I said. I did not say that 10 per cent. of car owners will transfer to the Metro, as he seems to think I did. I said that 10 per cent. of the passengers on the Metro would be people who had previously used cars. There is a very big difference. I did not suggest that 75 per cent. of bus passengers would transfer to the Metro, but that 75 per cent. of predicted passengers on the Metro would be people who had previously travelled by bus.

Only 10 per cent. of passengers on the Metro, according to Centro's own figures, would be people who had previously travelled by car. If it were 10 per cent. of car owners, as my hon. Friend would like, that would be an incredible improvement ; it really would bring about a major reduction in congestion in the west midlands. I wish I could see that day. There are ways, but I would not be in order if I proceeded to discuss how we could get 10 per cent. of car owners out of their cars and on to public transport. I have ideas about that, and I think that my hon. Friend has very good ideas about that, too. I have just one thing to say to him. I went--I do not think that he was able to be there, although my hon. Friend the Member for West Bromwich East was and made a very good intervention--to a very interesting presentation recently. I thought more of it than my hon. Friend the Member for West Bromwich, East did. I think that it would be fair to say that he was more critical than I was. I was very enthusiastic about it. The presentation was made by West Midlands Travel, whose representatives were talking about how we could increase the number of people using buses and achieve a major shift from car-driving to bus-using in the conurbation. The presentation was very exciting. I shall not pursue that subject, however, as that is not what we are discussing this evening.

I want to return to the most important reasons why we should not consider the Bill further. The most important point--I am not surprised that the hon. Member for Yardley wishes to divert us from it--arises from what the hon. Gentleman told the House nearly a year ago. The hon. Gentleman is not even listening, and that is the whole point--Centro will not listen, and its representative in the House will not listen.

A year ago, the hon. Gentleman told the House that if we gave the Bill a Second Reading, it would proceed to its Committee stage and be fully examined. As the hon. Gentleman knows, however, Centro made sure that that did not happen. Contrary to what the hon. Gentleman said today, Centro made sure that my constituents and other residents could not present their objections to the Committee. With the exception of the hon. Member for Yardley, every hon. Member who spoke in support of the Bill urged and advised Centro to act differently. My hon. Friends the Members for West Bromwich, East, for

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Walsall, North for Walsall, South--and, I think, even my hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton, South-East-- advised Centro not to use the obscure parliamentary procedure of objecting to the locus standi of residents. The hon. Member for Yardley, who I know gets carried away, misled the House when he said that all the objections were considered by the Committee whose report we are considering. He said that only three petitions went to the Committee. He is right, but of those three petitions, two were not from residents and one put only part of the case of one of the five residents' groups which originally petitioned against the Bill. That was significant, as I shall explain in a moment. The residents of Bromford estate were not allowed to put their case to the Committee, despite what had been said previously.

Mr. Snape : In my role as assistant or arbiter in these matters, perhaps in fairness to Centro I should explain that when my hon. Friend and I and other hon. Members criticised its decision not to allow my hon. Friend's constituents to present their petition, Centro told me that it had done so because it had received advice from the authorities of the House to the effect that it should interpret the rules as strictly as possible. I paraphrase, but that was basically the story that Centro told me after a similar exchange at an early stage in our proceedings on the Bill.

Mr. Davis : That is the story that Centro will have told my hon. Friend, but it is not wholly correct. I will explain what Centro meant by "the authorities of the House". The Joint Committee on Private Bill Procedure drew attention to the locus standi rules, but that does not absolve Centro. Centro told me that it was the fault of Sherwood and Company, the parliamentary agents, and that it had put the Bill in the hands of Sherwood and Company and not in the hands of the hon. Member for Yardley. According to Centro, Sherwood and Company took the decision to challenge the locus standi of my constituents. I was interested to discover, following my research, that only two bodies had used that obscure procedure--Centro and British Rail. Those are the bodies that have tried to stifle the opinions of ordinary people and used the procedure to prevent them from being heard. The implications are tremendous, and to hon. Members they are horrifying. The procedure did not have to be used. No promoter of any other private Bill has tried to stop people presenting their views to the Committee set up for that purpose.

Mr. George : My hon. Friend has made his case very strongly over the last hour and three quarters. He is very concerned that people should be allowed to express their views. Having listened to him patiently, I should be exceedingly grateful if he would allow other Members to have their say before the debate ends at 10 o'clock.

Mr. Davis : I invited my hon. Friend the Member for Walsall, South to speak before me. I suspected that the hon. Member for Yardley would interrupt-- [Interruption.] --as indeed he has. I was anxious to give my hon. Friend a chance to speak. [Interruption.] We do not have to finish--the Bill can be carried forward to another date. If we are forced to vote on a closure motion, I shall vote to allow my hon. Friend to have his say.

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I shall not be distracted from making the point that I have to make--that Centro prevented my constituents from presenting their case to the Committee. But that is not all. Earlier, Mr. Deputy Speaker, you asked me about routes. The alternative route suggested by my constituents cannot be considered on the Floor of the House. Centro employed Queen's counsel to prevent ordinary working people from explaining their objections. As a result, the Committee was prevented from considering those objections, and the House is prevented from considering and voting on what my constituents suggest. In addition, I am advised that, because of the actions of Centro, it will be impossible for Members of another place to consider that alternative. I shall not take up the time of the House by referring to the reasons that were given, which are very technical and complicated. It is important to note that there has been another development. Earlier, there was a reference to Mr. Tarr, the director general of Centro. Recently, Mr. Tarr went to a meeting to discuss another route--a route in Coventry--to which people had objected. As I have no desire to interfere in other Members' constituencies, I was not present, but I am told that Mr. Tarr explained to the people of Coventry that their views could be heard by the Committee. A constituent of mine, who was present, tells me that he asked, "In that case, why did you prevent the people of Birmingham from having their views considered by the Committee?" He was not given an answer.

Mr. Snape : Perhaps I can help my hon. Friend. I have just been reading about the meeting to which he refers. The press cuttings describe that part of Coventry as a yuppie stronghold. I do not know whether that is true, but I am sure that such a description does not fit the portion of my right hon. Friend's constituency to which he refers.

Mr. Davis : Certainly not--and the constituent to whom I have referred certainly could not be regarded as a yuppie. As secretary of the residents group, he was prevented from explaining the alternative route that my constituents wished to suggest. I hope that my hon. Friend is not suggesting that the attitude adopted by Centro towards yuppies in Coventry is different from that adopted towards the people of the Bromford estate. That would be outrageous.

The Committee considered two petitions. I have here a copy of the notes that the Chairman was using when he explained the Committee's decisions. We heard that there were three petitions but one of them was withdrawn. In the case of Foseco, the Committee decided to ask the promoter to devise a new route which would not pass through the site of the factory. Foseco was a business, of course--not a group of residents--and it managed to get to the Committee to persuade it that Centro had behaved so badly that there should be a new route.

Mr. Bevan : For the sake of accuracy, if the hon. Gentleman has read the papers he must agree that that decision was taken because of the sensitivity of the instruments used in the process. The diversion was agreed for the special reason that it would have been very difficult to move those instruments.

Mr. Davis : That is an interesting intervention. The hon. Gentleman concedes that that action was taken only because of the petition to the Select Committee. Centro had not intended to do anything about Foseco's sensitive

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instruments until the company explained to the Select Committee why its case was so important. That is the point-- Centro prevented my constituents from explaining why they were sensitive.

The hon. Member for Yardley has made much of the sensitive instruments. I care, perhaps more than he does, about the sensitivity of ordinary people. Centro has prevented ordinary people, residents and people whose only investment is in their homes, from explaining their arguments to the Select Committee. Centro knew that that would prevent me from putting a detailed case on my constituents' behalf to the House at this late stage-- [Interruption.] I have taken advice from the Clerks about this and they doubt whether my constituents will be able to present an alternative in the other place. That is a direct result of Centro's actions, which are endorsed by the hon. Member for Yardley--the only hon. Member to have condoned Centro's actions.

This point is important because another group managed to get to the Select Committee. The CARE residents group from Chelmsley Wood, which is not in my constituency, presented half its objections. The Chairman of the Select Committee said :

"So far as the CARE residents are concerned we have listened most diligently to their case. We were not, however, convinced by their argument that the route should not pass through their area. Nevertheless"--

this is the key point--

"we hope to be able to ameliorate the effects of the Bill on the local residents and to this end we seek a number of undertakings from the Promoters".

Five undertakings are then listed. As a result of CARE's presenting half its case, the people whom it represents have benefited from five undertakings from Centro. However, those undertakings had to be extracted from Centro. My constituents could not get any undertakings. Sherwood and Company is employed by Centro, and it represents Centro just as the hon. Member for Yardley represents Centro. Those people should be ashamed because they have stopped ordinary people from having their views heard by the Select Committee.

The hon. Member for Yardley referred to my earlier comments about the residents, meeting with the chairman of the PTA. I was there and I noted that he said :

"We have drawn our battle plans and are absolutely entrenched." Mr. George : We have heard that before.

Mr. Davis : We certainly have. The chairman went on :

"There is no chance of re-routing, not since the Bill was put in Parliament."

The hon. Member for Yardley has said that my constituents have had an opportunity to discuss the matter with heads of Centro. However, the chairman of Centro--the "top head"--has said that there is no chance of re- routing since the Bill entered Parliament.

I want to make a special point about the figures to which I am referring. The cost of the proposal from my constituents is £6.5 million. However, the amendment which appears in the promoter's statement today will cost £6 million. One organisation has managed to have its petition heard by the Select Committee and there is an amendment which will cost an additional £6 million. My constituents, however, were thwarted, obstructed and stifled--they could not present their petition to the Select

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Committee for an amendment that would have cost £6.5 million. That is unfair and undemocratic, and it is why we should not allow the Bill to be considered today.

I repeat that my constituents and I are not opposed to the concept of Metro --just to one small section of the route. We believe that a compromise could have been achieved, whereby my constituents would not have been affected and the Metro would have been allowed to proceed from Birmingham to Solihull. According to the chairman, it is Centro that refused to talk to my constituents, in good faith--and it is Centro that prevented my constituents from putting their case to the Select Committee. It should therefore not be allowed to take the Bill any further today because that is not fair. Centro should be told that it has not behaved properly.

I do not want to stop the route which goes through Walsall. I understand the wish of my hon. Friend the Member for Walsall, South to support that route and I shall not do anything to stop it. So far as I am concerned, that route can go ahead.

Mr. George : My hon. Friend is vetoing it.

Mr. Davis : No, I am not vetoing it. Will my hon.Friend say why he thinks that I am doing that? If my hon. Friend were to rise, I should be pleased to hear his point of view.

Mr. George : I am grateful for the chance to intervene, but I should have much preferred 15 minutes to explain my case. My hon. Friend accuses Centro of preventing free speech, but he has fallen into the trap of doing exactly the same thing.

Mr. Davis : My hon. Friend is mistaken. He has been a Member of the House longer than I have and he should know that I am not stopping him speaking. I say this in all comradeship and friendship. I am not stopping my hon. Friend speaking.

Mr. George : My hon. Friend has done just that.

Mr. Davis : No, my hon. Friend has mistaken the procedures of the House. We do not have to vote today. We can go forward and resume the debate. My hon. Friend can then have more than 15 minutes. I should like him to speak. That is why I asked him if he would like to speak before me. I offered to give way before I even started

Mr. Bevan rose in his place and claimed to move, That the Question be now put.

Question put, That the Question be now put :--

The House divided : Ayes 88, Noes 9.

Division No. 76] [9.56 pm

AYES

Alexander, Richard

Amos, Alan

Arbuthnot, James

Arnold, Jacques (Gravesham)

Baker, Nicholas (Dorset N)

Bellingham, Henry

Bellotti, David

Bennett, Nicholas (Pembroke)

Bevan, David Gilroy

Blackburn, Dr John G.

Boswell, Tim

Brazier, Julian

Brown, Michael (Brigg & Cl't's)

Browne, John (Winchester)

Campbell, Menzies (Fife NE)

Cash, William

Chapman, Sydney

Clark, Rt Hon Sir William

Currie, Mrs Edwina

Davies, Q. (Stamf'd & Spald'g)

Davis, David (Boothferry)

Fallon, Michael

Fenner, Dame Peggy

Field, Barry (Isle of Wight)

Finsberg, Sir Geoffrey

Fowler, Rt Hon Sir Norman

Freeman, Roger

Gill, Christopher

Goodlad, Alastair

Gorman, Mrs Teresa

Greenway, John (Ryedale)

Gregory, Conal

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